SCHIEFFER: Can I just interrupt you? I have to say, Barack Obama hasn’t had any of these experiences either, nor has he ridden in a fighter plane and gotten shot down.

CLARK: I don’t think getting in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to become president.

That is some weak bullshit, acting like Clark was out there spearheading an attack. I watched that yesterday and didn’t think anything of it. Hell, I even blogged about Lieberman’s appearance and didn’t even mention Clark, it was so inconsequential. It wasn’t even really directed at McCain, but more of an attempt at correcting Schieffer.

Ahh, the McCain mancrush. Get used to it though- liberal media and all that. And man, did Dday nail that when he said to “Get Ready For The Mother Of All Hissy Fits.”

So much for not talking about this crap, although in my defense, this was hardly an attack and not what I was talking about. Oh, and new category for this mancrush.

I don’t know what Obama is supposed to do. The media was going to play this out 24/7 and defend McCain and act like Clark attacked McCain’s record without playing the actual tape and showing the context and all that.

I think Obama should be fighting back more, but in this media environment, everything said by Obama (and Democrats) gets put into the worst possible connotation while Republicans and McCain can get away with saying practically anything.

It sucks, but I think it’s the main reason why Democrats are so unwilling to fight back. The media pundits hate them, and will do everything possible to make it look good for the Republicans.

We should have Clark’s back. If Obama won’t stand up for it, the rest of us should. This is utter bullshit. Shame on the Obama campaign as well for not sticking up for him. I partially understand as it will drag the Obama campaign from it’s message and they’ll be discussing this crap for ever if he got involved. This stuff over Clark will last a week.

CNN can go fuck itself. There’s a reason I don’t watch any of the cable news channel. If I want to sprayed with bullshit, I’d go to a farm.

Bob Schieffer: Well you, you went so far as to say that you thought John McCain was, quote, and these are your words, “untested and untried,” And I must say I, I had to read that twice, because you’re talking about somebody who was a prisoner of war. He was a squadron commander of the largest squadron in the Navy. He’s been on the Senate Armed Services Committee for lo these many years. How can you say that John McCain is un- untested and untried? General?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Because in the matters of national security policy making, it’s a matter of understanding risk. It’s a matter of gauging your opponents, and it’s a matter of being held accountable. John McCain’s never done any of that in his official positions. I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in Armed Forces as a prisoner of war. He has been a voice on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and he has traveled all over the world. But he hasn’t held executive responsibility. That large squadron in Air- in the Navy that he commanded, it wasn’t a wartime squadron. He hasn’t been there and ordered the bombs to fall. He hasn’t seen what it’s like when diplomats come in and say, ‘I don’t know whether we’re going to be able to get this point through or not. Do you want to take the risk? What about your reputation? How do we handle it-‘

Bob Schieffer: Well-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: ‘ -it publicly.’ He hasn’t made those calls, Bob.

Bob Schieffer: Well, well, General, maybe-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: So-

Bob Schieffer: Could I just interrupt you. If-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Sure.

Bob Schieffer:I have to say, Barack Obama has not had any of those experiences either, nor has he ridden in a fighter plane and gotten shot down. I mean-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I don’t think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be President.

Bob Schieffer: Really?!

Schieffer’s rotten performance is the most pathetic, frightened deliberate mis-interpretation I’ve heard a non-rightwingnut grown man speak on TV in a loooong time.

Goddamit, attack through surrogates is how the game is played. Obama knows this. Why kneecap Clark when he’s got a good message?

I was hoping for a new Democratic politics. Well, I certainly have a new kind of candidate but it looks as though he’s hellbent on losing the time-honored way of all Democratic candidates; the Dem goes out looking noble by heaping praise galore on their opponent, while the Gooper shovels dirt onto the Dem candidacy’s grave.

Fuck. If we can’t win this election we don’t deserve to win another one again. Ever.

I know we get pissed at Democrats for this stuff, but we really should be pissed at the media. Obama wasn’t responding to the correctly posted transcript, he was responding to the media narrative built around a false premise. What was he supposed to do?

Oh my, I think I shall have an attack of the vapors. After all, every manly man who has ever been taken prisoner by our evil enemies and been tortured is obviously eminently qualified to lead our Great Nation, and this cannot ever be questioned. Particularly if the Manly Man in question is a gooper, even if he’s a number one loose cannon, and the person doing the questioning is a Democrat, even if a retired general. It goes against all the rules.

I can’t help but feel this over-reaction against Clark comes from Repub/media fear that Obama was considering him as VP. What better way to undermine that choice, which I think would have been excellent, than by sabotaging the guy right out of the blocks.

The Repubs were terrified of Clark, now Obama has erased his name from the list. Strange goings on.

The McCain campaign quickly trotted out retired Admiral Leighton “Snuffy” Smith (no, not kidding on nickname) to blast away at Clark, according to CNN:

“If Barack Obama wants to question John McCain’s service to his country, he should have the guts to do it himself and not hide behind his campaign surrogates,” Smith said.
Needless to say, stating that McCain has had no executive responsibility and that getting shot out of the sky is not a presidential qualification is not the equivalent of questioning McCain’s service to country, no matter how horrified Admiral Snuffy wants to play it.

and someone noted: “Did a surrogate just attack a candidate for having a surrogate speak for them?”

I wonder who the fuck is advising them? Rahm Emmanuel? If it is, the campaign is over.

I think that the exact thing I was afraid was going to happen is happening – the campaign saw their early leads in the polls and became too cautious.

They are not going to win by running a cautious campaign. If people want a “safe” choice, they will vote for McCain. Obama needs to give them a compelling alternative, and running a standard (i.e., lukewarm and weak) Democratic campaign is not the way to do that.

something has happened to Obama in the last couple of weeks. i’m not liking it. not at all.

I’m with you man, and I’m a big fan of his. He’s been less than stellar the past couple of weeks. I realize he’s got a lot of shit being thrown at him and he’s trying to reduce the damage, but goddam it he needs to go on the attack, if you pussyfoot this shit nothing is going to happen. I suppose being black or half black you’re a bit nervous whether people have your back or not.

I like Shieffer, but that was a fairly stupid comment that immediately led to Clark’s reply. Close call, but think I’ll have to side with Clark that getting shot down shouldn’t be a litmus test for becoming president.

Didn’t see that Face the Nation show, but did watch a clip of the entire Shieffer/Clark exchange. Don’t think what Clark said anytime during the interview rises to the level of an attack on McCain’s service. McCain has made experience an issue in national security matters claiming he’s qualified, Obama isn’t. Clark was simply stating McCain’s military service alone didn’t qualify him to make sound policy decisions.

Yep, great response from the Obama campaign. How very Democratic Party of them. I’d take Wes Clark in a heartbeat over Obama.

Riding in a fighter plane in Vietnam & getting shot down = QUALIFIES U FOR PREZNIT IF U —> REPUBLICAN.

Riding in a motorboat on a Vietnam & getting shot multiple times = NOT QUALIFIES U FOR PREZNIT IF U —> DEMOCRAT + U LOOK FRENCH TRAITOR. PURPLE BANDAIDZ!

Obviously, John Kerry was unfit for service because he was too close to water. My four day harmonious time cube has informed me that math goes west, not to pick up copper, and you don’t vote for a Presidential Candidate who is too close to water.

Look at George Bush. He’s from Texas. There’s no water in Texas. John McCain? Arizona. No water there. Barack Obama? He’s from Chicago, a port city. Kerry? Massachusetts. Omg, so much water.

Why this isn’t crystal clear to you is beyond me. PRESIDENT + WATER = BAD PRESIDENT. What brought down Nixon? Watergate. Remember when Jimmy Carter got too close to that rabbit in his row boat? End of the Presidency, right there.

I don’t think getting in a fighter plane [Swiftboat] and getting shot down [at] is a qualification to become president

Yea, I remember that, and also every wingnut taking head pontificate in loud unison that Kerry making a big deal of his military service made it peachy for them to criticize it.

And they did with vim and vigor, and the media response was well, have at it, and we’ll provide a round the clock venue to mock Kerry’s service to air your opinions lies because It’s our job to vet the dem candidate thoroughly.

And then came the Swiftboater’s who accused Kerry of everything from causing his own wounds to hijacking the entire naval chain of command to nominate and award himself several medals. All without presenting a single shred of evidence other than thirty five year old memories and a long held grievance at Kerry for his actions AFTER his service.

And the media response was well, it’s our job to give you a month of wall to wall airtime to air your opinions lies because er.. well, it’s our job to, and we won’t ask you for hard evidence until you’ve said your Lies ad nauseum on the nations airwaves for a solid month.

Yep, great response from the Obama campaign. How very Democratic Party of them. I’d take Wes Clark in a heartbeat over Obama.

Which is why Clark is the nominee instead of Obama. Er, wait-

Clark may have had a point, but he utterly botched it with that soundbyte. Remember the old sage about never having a second chance to make a first impression? Clark just made his first impression, good luck trying to make the argument of ‘Well, that’s not what he really meant!’ in the ensuing maelstrom. Best damage control Obama could do would be to sweep it under the rug and let the news cycle run its course.

For those who have fought under the flag of this nation – for the young veterans I meet when I visit Walter Reed; for those like John McCain who have endured physical torment in service to our country – no further proof of such sacrifice is necessary.

Acting heroically in a Swift boat does qualify you to NOT be labeled as some anti-American coward, like Republicans think they have the right to do, unless the major news media allow a bunch of lying fraud-bags to do just that.

John Kerry was qualified to be President for other reasons, such as his policies, unlike McCain, who has nothing but a “Maverick” reputation and a load of sh*tty, harmful right wing policies.

[…] Ya know what? I don’t think that flying a jet, or getting shot down in and of itself qualifies anyone to be president either. I’m of the opinion that one’s shoddy service in the Air National Guard, barely limping through one’s tour, possibly going AWOL, drinking and snorting your way through to the end while your cohort fights and dies halfway around the world is a far superior benchmark of judgment and true grit. Haven’t we learned anything from the last 7 years? […]

For the second time in as many weeks, I got the Uh-Oh Scary feeling in the pit of my stomach re Obama’s campaign. First it was FISA and now rejecting, renouncing, whatever Clark’s spot-on comments! WTF?

Yuck. The media says “jump,” and the Obama campaign asks “how high?” Maybe it’s just an unfortunate series of events, but this has been a dispiriting couple of weeks since Obama secured the nomination.

Yeah, Obama’s statement is a shame. Maybe he just doesn’t want to go the mat for Clark. But he probably would have done better to tell the press not to hold him responsible for statements originating outside the campaign.

I admit I don’t know what he’s doing on this and on FISA. Standing up repeatedly and firmly to wingnut nonsense is IMHO a necessary condition for an Obama victory.

Standing up repeatedly and firmly to wingnut nonsense is IMHO a necessary condition for an Obama victory.

Funny, this on the day when Obama gave a speech calling bullshit on the people questioning his patriotism. Clark’s sin wasn’t so much the attack itself as the fact he was waaaay off message and stepped on Obama’s dick. He sucked the oxygen from a news cycle that should have been net positive for Obama.

Just worth noting, but I don’t think Clark is one of Obama’s dudes. That is to say, he’s a Democrat, but I thought he was in the Clinton camp. Maybe Obama is just refusing to clean up after people he isn’t directly affiliated with. For the time being, “Rally ’round the message” has become a rather central theme of the Obama campaign.

Complete utter bullshit. At no time during the interview did Clark denigrate military service nor McCain’s personal service record.

That’s not the point. Clark said something unflattering about McCain’s war record. You might get it, I might get it, but Bob and Irma back home who only know McCain as a presidential candidate and former POW are going ‘Oh no he didn’t.’ You think they’re running to YouTube or Beat The Press to get the full Schieffer-Clark exchange?

You say he “botched it with that soundbyte” hurting Obama? Leading to a feared “maelstrom”? You must be aware of and embrace all Democratic Party traditions.

Name me one time when a candidate was able to shift the narrative in a situation such as this.

No he didn’t, and that is the whole point. He simply made the point that it is not relevent to being president. Woldgang Puck is a good chef, and if I happen to make the point that the fact he is a good chef is not relevent to him being president would you claim I said something unflattering about his record as a chef?

Personally, I think both Clark and the Obama campaign know exactly what they’re doing.

Clark said what needed to be said. It needed to be said because the mainstream media is accepting as the default Received Wisdom and Universal Truth that “of COURSE McCain is a foreign policy expert and a great leader! He was a POW, fercryinoutloud!”

SOMEONE had to say, “That doesn’t even make sense.” But this is the media and their conventional wisdom we’re talking about, and challenging their dogma makes them uncomfortable and angry. The first person who dares to say, “That doesn’t even make sense” is going to be the recipient of a pile-on. So who better to take that first bullet that someone who is NOT a part of the Obama campaign, and is not a member of the ‘always for Obama’ group?

This is the camel’s nose under the tent, and we need to be back at the camel’s tail pushing as hard as we can, to get the media to take a moment and ask themselves, “Wait a minute – how DOES spending five years in a North Vietnamese cell four decades ago demonstrate foreign policy expertise and the ability to manage a mind-bogglingly large and complex organization?”

Maybe you should look at how McCain has treated those folks who still care about those MIAs.

Oh, dear lord. Please tell me we’re not going to be listening to Ted Sampley. Before anyone gleefully takes up and passes on some Sampley quotes because they’re thrilled to find a Vietnam Vet McCain critic, for pity’s sake, Google the man first! He’s a lunatic and a con man.

Maybe its just my neighborhood, but the local veterans’ hall still has a POW/MIA flag flying out front.

Oh yeah, I can fully see that. Clark pissed on POW/MIAs when responding to Schieffer’s “but he rode in a fighter and was shot down” with his observation that being shot down doesn’t necessarily qualify someone to make sound policy decisions. Is that POW/MIA connection clearly discerned in the kerning of Clark’s response? Completely missed that

Fuck McCain and his blowhard self-importance. It’s his insistence on being treated as if he were somebody worthy of reverence that makes him, his campaign and anybody who falls for it deserving of being treated with contempt.

Oh, dear lord. Please tell me we’re not going to be listening to Ted Sampley. Before anyone gleefully takes up and passes on some Sampley quotes because they’re thrilled to find a Vietnam Vet McCain critic, for pity’s sake, Google the man first! He’s a lunatic and a con man.

The worst part of this War Hero crap is that it perpetuates itself. In 10 or 15 years we’ll be dealing with “I SERVED IN IRAQ and you didn’t” wanking – translation: I served proudly in a stupid, criminal and ugly war so make me President for me to make another stupid, criminal and ugly war, run loop.

I think the line was hilarious (unintentionally) and makes McCain look quite bad. Which is why the Republican noise machine is having the vapors. Fine, have the vapors. It’s a memorable line and the more it’s repeated the more people will remember McCain as the man whose biggest service was, well, getting shot down and captured. Those aren’t the skills people want in the president.

It’s like McCain is playing a game of seeing how outrageously hypocritical he can be before anyone in the media (or apparently the Obama campaign) will call him on it: His surrogate for this fake outrage, Bud Day, was in the Swift Boat ads against Kerry.

Sorry to say it, but this is the Obama who’s been there all along. This is what he was like and what he was doing when the primaries started. And it’s what he’s done all the way up. It’s not just now. He triangulates right, gives great speeches, and takes no stands or risks, and that’s what he’s always done, in every legislature and every campaign he’s been in.

Not that I’m crazy about Hillary or anything, but if you didn’t think that this was the guy you were rooting for all along… what was it that W said about fool me twice?

Personally, I think both Clark and the Obama campaign know exactly what they’re doing.

Whatever the reason they have chosen to go after McCain’s service, I think this didn’t work as intended, and Obama now looks disloyal to Clark when he doesn’t at least try to explain that Clark did not denigrate McCain’s service. So his surrogate is being characterized as swift-boating his opponent, and he is being characterized as “throwing Clark under the bus.” Sounds like “strategery” to me. This has not been a good couple of weeks for Obama, who I still strongly support.

Did the Obama campaign really think they could question McCain’s service without getting pushback from the media, who love McCain? If they did, that’s fucking stupid of them.

We have an abundance of issues to go after McCain on, some of them, given the current state of our economy, should resonate nicely even with the nuance-impaired (most of whom can do enough math to know they’re being fucked). Why choose this issue?

What’s next, does Clark apologize for his remarks? This is bullshit, and this campaign is not looking very strong right now.

Of course Obama wants to put an end to Patriotism as an issue, because Obama is the one who’s patriotism is in question! He conveniently condems questioning patiotism, but where was he when his hatchet men came up with General Betray Us??? Also, why isn’t Iraq, or Afganistan on Obama’s upcoming itinery? Obama knows he can’t compete with McCain on the issue of patriotism, so he’s trying to make it a non issue. Obama has no experience, except to listen to God Damn America for 20 years!

I couldn’t stand Wes Clark in 2003 because of his very odd, creepy change in position on the war and some other things I can’t quite recall. Don’t hate ‘im anymore though. You learn to take what you can get, after while.

This could be a clever backroom ruse between Obama camp and Clark. Get Clark to raise the issue and let Obama look all ‘above it’ and shit, but it still opens the gates to the discussion of McCain’s military service record. I’m just sayin’

I don’t know what Obama is supposed to do. The media was going to play this out 24/7 and defend McCain and act like Clark attacked McCain’s record without playing the actual tape and showing the context and all that.

This sounds awfully like JJC’s bleg and paean to the higher art of blessed “Pragmatism” on the whole FISA debacle.
Face it. Obama is the personification of pussification.

Of course Obama wants to put an end to Patriotism as an issue, because Obama is the one who’s patriotism is in question! He conveniently condems questioning patiotism, but where was he when his hatchet men came up with General Betray Us???

Moveon.org are Obama henchmen? Are you fucking kidding? Sure, they support Obama now that he is the Democratic Party nominee, but that was not the case back in September 2007. And the whole point of moveon is that they are independant and self-funding, and not anybody’s ‘henchmen’.

SOMEONE had to say, “That doesn’t even make sense.” But this is the media and their conventional wisdom we’re talking about, and challenging their dogma makes them uncomfortable and angry. The first person who dares to say, “That doesn’t even make sense” is going to be the recipient of a pile-on. So who better to take that first bullet that someone who is NOT a part of the Obama campaign, and is not a member of the ‘always for Obama’ group?

This is the camel’s nose under the tent, and we need to be back at the camel’s tail pushing as hard as we can, to get the media to take a moment and ask themselves, “Wait a minute – how DOES spending five years in a North Vietnamese cell four decades ago demonstrate foreign policy expertise and the ability to manage a mind-bogglingly large and complex organization?”

No. It’s not. This is an immunization for McCain. Can you smell the scent of rubber burning in the air? That’s Obama smoking the fucking tires on his bus backing the fook away from Clark as fast as it will go. Ever see the cartoon where the coyote runs out into the clouds past the edge of the cliff and when the smoke clears he’s all by himself out in space, looking down at a hell of a long way?
That’s Clark after Obama bussed his ass.
How do you think the next person who raises the tent flap on this will be treated? We’ll never know because it will never happen again from anyone with as much/more credibility than Clark. Sure, some fringer or hanger on may invoke it but the media will ignore him/her and if they don’t then Obama will treat them like a low level staffer and dismiss them.
Anyone remember how GWB did his thing during the campaigns when one of his surrogates pantsed somebody? Bush was asked about it and he’d shrug his shoulders and smirk a little and say, “Aw shucks, that doesn’t sound like good ole what’s his face would say. I’m not saying it you understand, but good ole what’s his face may be.”
He never disavowed anyone or anything IIRC. Why did Obama have to get up and play holier than thou here? He didn’t! He bussed Clark for no fookin good reason. He certainly didn’t gain a god damned thing with centrists and he’s once again disappointed his numerical base. Where’s the payoff for this?

I want to say that I mourn for my country when an obvious BS story like this is causing so much apoplectic outrage, but then my guess is that the only people who are getting off on this are the same dorks who think Al Gore said he invented the Internet and John Kerry got his Purple Heart for shooting himself in the foot.

Of course Obama wants to put an end to Patriotism as an issue, because Obama is the one who’s patriotism is in question! He conveniently condems questioning patiotism, but where was he when his hatchet men came up with General Betray Us??? Also, why isn’t Iraq, or Afganistan on Obama’s upcoming itinery? Obama knows he can’t compete with McCain on the issue of patriotism, so he’s trying to make it a non issue. Obama has no experience, except to listen to God Damn America for 20 years!

Yeah, the guy who can’t differentiate between Sunnis and Shiites has the experience we need.

[…] Just a tiny post before bed, but since I’m (on reflection, rightly) getting reamed here for specious political attacks, can I at least pour one on the ground for Wes Clark? I agree with John Cole, he’s getting boned. […]

All that spending 5 years getting tortured as a POW qualifies you for is a lifetime of physical and psychological therapy and a 100% disability rating from the U.S. Navy. None of which I begrudge McCain at all, but they don’t qualify him to be President. The man suffered for his country, but that doesn’t change the fact that he’s been wrong on, well, pretty much everything over the past six years. Suffering doesn’t make you smarter. What brains you got is what you got. And McCain’s brains ain’t been workin’ well lately, what with all his mixups of Sunni and Shia and shit that he’s been gaffing lately.

Of course Obama wants to put an end to Patriotism as an issue, because Obama is the one who’s patriotism is in question!

To properly frame this: Obama wants to put an end to it as an issue because he’s one who is being attacked on it by traitorous scum like you who have defiled this country. You should thank him for taking it off the table, sparing all of you from the gallows.

Ever see the cartoon where the coyote runs out into the clouds past the edge of the cliff and when the smoke clears he’s all by himself out in space, looking down at a hell of a long way?
That’s Clark after Obama bussed his ass.
How do you think the next person who raises the tent flap on this will be treated? We’ll never know because it will never happen again from anyone with as much/more credibility than Clark.

This is real life, not a cartoon, dipshit. Obama’s campaign weakly dissed Clark and Clark came right back and pretty much repeated what he had said previously. Now is the opportunity for people like Clark — people who aren’t cowards — to make a point of this, despite the lily livers of Obama’s campaign and even Obama himself.

Indeed it is. But Obama is also the guy who is far more likely than McCain to create an environment where progressives can enact their agenda. People act as if they think there is one guy who runs the entire government himself, and as if that consists of waking up every morning and deciding whether or not the war in Iraq will continue. Obama or McCain winning in November determines whether or not reactionaries and reactionary policies continue to rule. That’s the case no matter how far Obama deviates from perfection or from one’s own political stances (which for many people seem to be the same thing).

Here’s the thing about criminally hypocritical scum like Howard: If you ask that sort of question of them, no matter how legitimately, of Bush or McCain or any of their brethren, they will attack you a rabid partisan who hates America, or Bush, or whatever. But when they ask it, they don’t care about the answer or the facts. Here we have Obama throwing Wesley Clark under the bus for his perfectly legitimate and accurate comments about McCain, but that isn’t good enough for Howard the Fuck. Not even the fact that Obama directly dissed MoveOn in his speech:

But that, like all fact and reason, doesn’t matter to moronic garbage like Howard. These people are indoctrinated cult members, drones set on the mission of protecting the great church of right wing scumitude.

Personally, I think both Clark and the Obama campaign know exactly what they’re doing.

How many gallons of koolaid did you drink? Do you think that Bob Schieffer was in on it too?

The Obama campaign’s response was politically, tactically, and strategically inept. They were doing a lot better when Obama was saying that what matters is judgment, not experience. They need to puncture the myth that McCain is a foreign policy expert, and chiding Clark for attacking McCain’s patriotism when Clark didn’t is not the way to do it. They also need very much to puncture the myth that McCain is a centrist, and deal with this picture that he’s painting of a forward thinker on energy and the environment. And they need, badly, to get the word out on how atrocious McCain is on women’s issues.

But he took Schieffer’s bait and Went There and you’re just don’t do that.

So what exactly should he have said? I’m going to ask the Obama campaign that tomorrow. I already called them today to note that Obama dissed Clark for no good reason and that he’s creating a lot of disaffection in his core activist support with this and his position on the FISA bill — the woman I spoke to was very nice and said that she’s been hearing the same sort of thing from many others and encouraged me to keep calling with my comments.

It’s fine for me or any of you to take swipes at McCain’s claims to experience from POW and it is true. At the same time Obama needs to be nowhere near it.

It won’t matter how reasoned or qualified the criticism is, see Clark, it will explode in his face. You should be taking that lesson away with you from the current BS for cripe’s sake. It isn’t a matter of being a pussy, it’s a matter of not being stupid.

However you want to think about it, somehow McCain has become sacrosanct on this one and ramming your head into a fait accompli won’t gain you ground. Some things just are. Stop and think about Wright’s ‘god damn’ expression, logically it makes perfect sense in relation to Christ, but it ain’t gonna play and it ain’t gonna get explained, it is just poison.

[…] 1, 2008 · No Comments John Cole makes a good point; it is not as if you need to trawl through hours of debate toreconstruct the context. SCHIEFFER: Can I just interrupt you? I have to say, Barack Obama hasn’t had any of these experiences either, nor has he ridden in a fighter plane and gotten shot down. […]

But Obama is also the guy who is far more likely than McCain to create an environment where progressives can enact their agenda. People act as if they think there is one guy who runs the entire government himself, and as if that consists of waking up every morning and deciding whether or not the war in Iraq will continue.

What progressive agenda? You mean like bringing FISA up for a vote when they absolutely did not have to? And what makes you think Obama has any intention of allowing any peek at a “progressive” agenda? Have you been watching and listening to the man? Just because he has a D by his name doesn’t mean he’s going to be “far more likely” to do jack shit for progressives.
And yes, one person does run the government. Dick Cheney. Can you make a coherent arguement that every major policy and decision made during the last 7 years has not been shaped or implemented by the current VP?

You packed an awful lot of stupid in one paragraph, and then capped it off by torpedoing your own argument — unless you really believe that Cheney is more like Obama than he is like McCain. Aside from the obvious fact that a McCain win would result in far more reactionary policies, it would also result in far more reactionaries filling the thousands of positions that it takes to run the federal government.

Nice non-rebuttal. What “obvious fact” are you referring to? The fact that *you* said it therefore it must be true?
Obama has repeatedly discussed appointing Republican’s to Cabinet positions. Who do you think they will hire into leadership roles? Progressive Democrats?
FISA, Faith based initiatives, praising Reagan, calling the last two term D president a racist….yep, those are all truly progressive ideas.
Fuck you.

Trackbacks & Pingbacks

[…] 1, 2008 · No Comments John Cole makes a good point; it is not as if you need to trawl through hours of debate toreconstruct the context. SCHIEFFER: Can I just interrupt you? I have to say, Barack Obama hasn’t had any of these experiences either, nor has he ridden in a fighter plane and gotten shot down. […]

[…] Just a tiny post before bed, but since I’m (on reflection, rightly) getting reamed here for specious political attacks, can I at least pour one on the ground for Wes Clark? I agree with John Cole, he’s getting boned. […]

[…] Ya know what? I don’t think that flying a jet, or getting shot down in and of itself qualifies anyone to be president either. I’m of the opinion that one’s shoddy service in the Air National Guard, barely limping through one’s tour, possibly going AWOL, drinking and snorting your way through to the end while your cohort fights and dies halfway around the world is a far superior benchmark of judgment and true grit. Haven’t we learned anything from the last 7 years? […]